The present invention relates to demountable walls for open office spaces and the like, and particular, to a floor-to-ceiling demountable wall system and related wall panels. Demountable wall systems for open office spaces, and other similar settings, are well known in the art. Individual wall panels are interconnected in different configurations to form walls extending from floor to ceiling for the creation of separate offices, work areas, or passageways. Partition panels are extremely durable, and can be readily disassembled and reassembled into alternative configurations to meet the ever-changing needs of the user.
The finishing or fitting-out of building spaces for offices, medical treatment facilities, and other similar environments has become a very important aspect of the effective space planning and layout. Work patterns, technology, and business organizations are constantly evolving and changing. The users of building space require products which facilitate change at lower costs. Space planning is no longer a static problem. Changing technology and changing work processes demand that a design and installation be able to support and anticipate change.
There is presently an over supply of office space and furniture systems which do not properly respond to or support change. Many older buildings do not have adequate utility capabilities, and the cost of conventional renovations or improvements often renders the same impractical. Even relatively new buildings can be quickly rendered obsolete by the fast paced changes in modern technology.
Consequently, fully integrated prefabricated furnishing systems have been developed to finish or fit-out both new and existing open plan building spaces. One requirement of this integrated furnishing system is a demountable floor-to-ceiling wall system having the capability for easy and rapid division of large work areas into smaller work areas, private offices, or a combination thereof. These individual work areas are in turn interconnected by passageways of various configurations as dictated by the particular work dynamics of the individual work areas. The work areas may be further divided into work stations using other well known modular office systems.
Another desired aspect of the present integrated furnishing system is to provide a demountable wall having increased flexibility for forming floor-to-ceiling walls which are assembled with a variety of preformed panels for multiple wall configurations and an interconnecting system which provides a stable wall while requires minimal use of labor intensive fasteners. For example, a demountable wall system is desired that only requires use of fasteners to affix the wall to the existing building architecture and the remainder of the wall system is constructed in building block style even where the dimensions of the office layouts are not dimensioned in multiples of standard construction materials. Additional functionality of the wall system is also desired, such as to permit the inclusion of doors or windows in desired locations without a requirement to modify the sizes and proportions of the individual panels comprising the wall. Further, the wall should provide acoustic isolation from adjacent work areas as well as providing a fire block between work areas.
Portions of such a demountable office wall system should also be relatively thin and adaptable to receive a variety of external panels to provide additional acoustic and fire protection, the routing of office utilities to individual users within the office environment, and aesthetically balance the demountable wall with the decor of other portions of the work areas without resulting in a wall of excessive thickness rendering valuable floor space useless. Thus, a relatively thin demountable wall system is desired which also possesses the modular characteristics similar to the modular characteristics of the office dividing system utilized within the work area.
Thus, a wall construction solving the aforementioned problems and providing the aforementioned functionality is desired.